OUR HISTORY

International Jet has a long and proud history. We celebrated our 40th year in business in September of 2019! Over those years a lot of great people have worked at the company or used our services. What follows is a brief look at our company’s history.

EARLY ROOTS

In 1979 Lynn Krogh and Bill Milam began the company in Long Beach, California. The first plane was a 1975 Cessna 421 turbo prop. Business was good and in February of 1980 the company acquired a Lear 24 and moved the operation to Denver, Colorado, where space was rented from Tiger Air. During this time International Jet flew a lot of cargo flights for Emery Air Freight and Purolator.

In June of 1980 we added a Lear 25 and became the first charter Lear Jet at Centennial Airport. Our first hangar, today’s maintenance hangar, was built shortly after arriving in Denver. Today, International Jet is the longest tenured company at Centennial Airport.

We flew cargo for several years and at one point we even operated a helicopter charter. Long-time Denver residents might remember Mike Silva, pilot of the KCNC-TV helicopter. He was the first pilot for the International Jet helicopter charter services—Shy Charter.

During this time we also had a military contract to fly missile launch codes to the different air bases throughout the United States. And then there was the time Ronald McDonald asked us to fly BeBe, a female gorilla, to the Cincinnati Zoo. (BeBe was sedated for the entire flight.) Did we say we have an interesting history? Cargo, top-secret military flights and a 700 pound gorilla—just another day’s work!

TRANSITION TO PASSENGER

Brian Smith joined International Jet in 1989 as the company was transitioning to more passenger charters. Columbia Air Life (later becoming HealthOne) became a long-time customer in the early ‘90s. Over a twenty-five year period International Jet flew more than 10,000 medical transports using twelve to fifteen different planes.